Riders of The Storm
A little Tale about how Old Lake Lahontan still to this day should be called "Lake Le Haunt On."
Take close note that the Tale you are about to be told is one of old that may in some cases for some individuals become more of a rather strange reality than it has been for others through the years. I will start this Tale off by saying, that long desolate desert highways in the middle of nowhere hold their own special type of weirdness. It's places like this where a person may experience what many may call The Paranormal or some kind of Paranormal Phenomena. This especially becomes true when driven through late at night and happens to be in an area where there are absolutely no street lights of any kind around.
Set and Setting
You just topped off your vehicle probably at some small town quick stop on your way. Likely this small town was a town called Fernley which is just off the interstate. Things seem fine so far, but you have already gotten word earlier in the day that you're going to have to drive through some areas that cell service is going to be rather sporadic.
"Hey! No problem!" you say to yourself while sitting in your vehicle at the pump. "I've done rides like this before and I even took a pee break while I had the chance to so I won't have to pull over. I also grabbed a munchie snack as well when I went inside to pay so all should be good till I can get to where I'm going."
You check your phone for service and see the bars are a bit lower than what they were so you quickly check your phone map to see how many miles you have left to go. "OK, I think I know where I'm at. This should only take me maybe about one more hour if I make good time and do not get carried away by getting into the music playing too much," your thoughts tell you as a local patrol car passes you in the parking lot reminding you of the other thing someone said about not speeding.
You start your vehicle after closing your door. "Click click!" goes your seat belt then you pull off heading down the roadway. The darkness starts to set in. Like really set in. The landscape gives into hues of the mountainous terrain surrounding this long stretch of roadway becoming more of only darkened areas off in the distance of an extremely clear starry sky.
Your thoughts wander off a bit. You adjust yourself in your seat to get a bit more comfortable while looking straight ahead wondering what is just beyond the reach of your headlights. This long desert highway after all is being driven late at night so being alert of things around you can become ever important, especially when you realize you haven't any vehicles behind you or coming towards you for a number of miles.
This road you're on is by what some say one of the darkest areas of the state of Nevada and also just about every state out there save maybe a state like Alaska. You find yourself listening to an old song by The Doors that is called "Riders of The Storm". "Oh! I haven't heard that in a long while!" you think and start singing the words to this song probably from memories way in your past.
At that particular moment, you are sitting comfortably in the vehicle you are driving in, but the reality slowly starts to creep into your mind that it is just you, this long stretch of highway, and there is absolutely nothing else around you other than maybe the occasional desert hare or coyote wandering around nearby where you can just barely make them out as they dart off away from the roadway.
For some odd reason, you start getting the feeling the vehicle you're in seems to suddenly not feel like it is actually moving, but the landscape around you is though. "Hmmm! Now that's odd!" You think to yourself. "How can this be?" is the second thought that crosses your mind. "Has the creeping into your mind of thoughts of your current reality started to play tricks on you a bit or is there something about that song?" might just happen to be your third thought of the night.
You try your best to get yourself into another train of thought, even changing what song is playing on the radio, but you can't seem to get it out of your mind. It's just you and whatever happens to be outside of your vehicle in this open landscape of a very darkened "Out in the middle of nowhere!" land.
You give in. "You have to get to where you're going regardless." your thoughts tell you. You have become The Stranger, The Traveler in this far-off land! You start to feel as if the Energy around you and outside the vehicle has somehow shifted on its own, unbeknownst to you, yet you feel as if you are sitting inside of a bubble that your mind is telling you is of its own kind of Other-Worldly feeling of existence.
Your thoughts tell you there was no old Oak tree along the way to give you some sort of marker of where you are. There weren't even any road signs up ahead that you can remember. You laugh to yourself thinking "Yeah! You know something like some warning saying: 'You are now entering The ... Zone!'". You tell yourself to shut up thinking about that, but it is indeed you and only you in this mobile vehicle of seeming motion without motion.
You pass over some grating in the road that looks like an old cattle gap and your tires make that strange sound you don't get to hear too often. "That wasn't bad!" and think "I might still be making good time! Yeah!" The silence outside your vehicle sets in more and more, but you can't help yourself—you have to roll down your window just to breathe in a bit of the cool crisp night air.
"Ahhh! Such a wonderful smell, but what is that hint of an odd dusty desert smell I'm smelling? Hmmm!" you think. You start to realize the air is not at all kicking up any dust to speak of. "So where is that smell coming from? Hmmm! That's weird! Oh! Maybe it's just from the dust on the roadway being kicked up by my tires from earlier in the day or from the right as the sun was going down and wind tends to kick up a bit in the desert," your thoughts tell you trying to justify that strange smell you're smelling as you still are having a strange feeling of sitting still while everything else around you is moving.
"Many a Ghost has probably crossed your path on this highway. Many an Entity has as well," your thoughts remind you of something else that was being said earlier in the day. "All come and go on a repeated cycle just waiting for some Lost Wanderer to lose their way," were some of the other words that just so happens to come to you in that very moment.
Then you hear these words coming to you soon afterward: "Take no invitations from those in the Shadows along the way, for they will bring you to places unknown in Time and Space." And next you hear: "The Haunted Lands you are crossing into are Lands of a Shadow World where even a light off in the dusty distance will give you a false view." Then remember hearing them also saying: "Follow not those lights! Follow not the rails and trails on this roadside of a Parallel World of Apparitions and Shadows Creatures!"
You start wondering what they mean by all of that and realize you forgot one thing in all of those words and it was the word "Dustance." "Dustance? Dustance? Strange choice of a word there I have to say! Maybe they were doing some play on their words and were crunching two words together or something. Yeah! That would make some sense, especially considering I'm smelling some type of strange desert smell I haven't smelled before in any other desert area I've been in. I do wonder what really is causing that smell? I'll have to remember to write that word down somewhere in my notes and remember to ask about what might be causing that peculiar smell," you say to yourself next just as some song called "Dreamcatcher" begins to play.
Then you hear out of nowhere your mind saying: "Ask yourself only one thing. How do you FEEL?" You think that is a rather strange thought to have, but then say, "OK. Whatever! I guess I feel a tad weird about this whole road not moving thing, but it does kinda look like I might be going somewhere. I'll take it! All is good I reckon!" Then next you hear: "The Dreamcatcher! Ah yes, The Dreamcatcher! Let all ills be caught in those Catchers of a Web, for neither Time nor Space matters where you ARE in this Moment!"
You realize at that moment you are talking to yourself in your own head and start nervously chuckling a bit just to break the ice on your thoughts and soon realize you see off in the dusty distance what looks to be some wooden road sign saying:
Welcome to Gelach "Fastest Town in the West"
POPULATION: WANTED: (sometimes)
ELEVATION: 3942'
And another plain white and black sign right below it saying all in caps:
GERLACH: MORE THAN JUST A PRETTY NAME
CENTER OF THE KNOWN UNIVERSE
WHERE THE PAVEMENT ENDS AND THE WEST BEGINS
POTLUCK CAPITAL OF THE WORLD
5,4,3 BARS, NO CHURCHES, NO WARS.
IS IT OCTOBER YET?
You put your headlights directly on this sign and step out of your vehicle almost wanting to kiss the ground for some weird and odd strange reason. You take a picture of this because at this point you know you are only just a couple miles away from your chosen "Dustination" supposedly and you have the address saved right in your phone that seems to now be picking up an additional cellphone bar or two of a signal than… "What is was… Ummm! Like it feels like hours ago!"
"Now where did all that time go anyway? Hell if I can remember now! I'm here, I think! Maybe! Everything is closed though so I sure hope I saved that address right! Yeah!" Then you, still feeling a tad bit nervous, step back into your vehicle trying to find out exactly where this address is.
The screen starts to fade to black and words
This Space-Time Story of a Strange Tale has been brought to you by the weird Hauntinly Strange Friends and Shadows of "The Inbetween Lands." Please give a like to your local ghostly Gerlach Haung and don't forget to time them before you leave!
